RE: [A/S] sagging entrance door on 97 Excella

["Perry Joe Scudder" <perryjoe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Jay,
Sorry to hear you are having a problem with your door, but glad to hear
you have made it back to where you are working on the trailer - home I
guess. I think the answer is to place a small shim between the DOOR and
the hinge at the bottom hinge. DO NOT loosen the screws that hold the
hinge to the trailer frame. They have nuts on the back that are only
held in place with a gob of caulk, and they will brake loose very easy.
Then the only way to get them tight again is to remove the trim molding
around the inside of the door opening, pull back the covering material,
then cut a hole in the inside aluminum skin large enough to get in there
and remove the gob of caulking and get a deep well socket on the nut. I
had to do this on my door because the hinges were loose when I got the
unit, and I could see where they were sliding around on the door frame.
The process of tightening the frame screws is not a fun job!!! When I
did get into mine, I put lock washers, ny-lock nut, and ny-lock jam nut
on each screw. I have not had any problems sense, and the fix was done
before we went to Alaska.
There was a thread on this list a year or so about this problem, and I
am pretty sure the answer was the small shim behind the lower hinge
between the hinge and the door its self. This would make sense as it
would cause the door to pivot about the upper hinge, therefore, raising
the lower front corner off the threshold.
Hope this helps, and keeps you out of having to get at the back of the
body side of the door hinges.

By the way, I went to Western North Carolina two weeks after we ran into
you in Cotter and caught over 50 trout it two afternoons of fishing (the
best one was a 22" Brown).

Joe and Mary Scudder
WBCCI 8624